Phillipsburg herald. [volume] (Phillipsburg, Kan.) 1882-1905, 1887-01-29
AHAPPY OCCASION.
London World.

London World
"Do not come too Iate.' That was the
wording Of the telegram which Captain
Richard Irton held in his hand as he sat,
in a temperature Of 100 degrees in the
shade, on the veranda Of his Indian bun
galow.
'.Do not come too late? % he muttered
to himself. By JOve, as If it were prob
able that he would dawdle nOWl 1t was
Just like Mrs LeDnOx to send such a
chatting wire as this. He might have
been long time making up his mind,
but it was made up now, and he meant
to go home and marry her. 1t was her
last letter that had settled the matter
the letter In which she limited that Lord
Shorthorn was awfully mashed" No,
he wasn't going to stand by and see Dor
Othy LennOx married 10 a cad like
ShorthOrn. He had been the whole
year, he reminded himself, In this infer
nal station, with its furnace heat, its
inane gossip, and its eternal tennis and
polo How he loathed the very sight of
his Majors wife, with her white eye
lashes, her malicious giggle and her
flirting manpersI
And then he thought Of Mrs. Lennox.
He remembered the first night he bad
met her in the ballroom of a great
house in LondOn-and how he had seen
her surrounded by a dozen other fellows,
and how he had made the running"
and had cut out all those outsiders. And
he recOlIected the call he had paid next
day at her tiny house in Park street,
when she had been SO sweet and grace
u, and had talked to MIN as no woman
had ever talked before. He didn't go IN
for brains OF any Of that rot, but, by
JOvel Dorothy LennOZ made him
feel another fellow. He thought Of the
cool, amber-tinted room where she al
ways sat, with its dropping palms, its
masses Of azaleas, its Rajan etchings,
and its blue and-White Nankin. 1t was
always cool and cosey in Mrs. LennOx's
house and she had a way OF taking a fell
lows hand aud looking him seriously in
the ey es which was quite irresistible. He
remembered how it had become almost
a habit to drop IN of an afternoon, to
lounge on her soft divan, and listen to
her half chatting talk and her low delic-
iOus laugh. And when a woman is
deuced good looking as well as clever,
why, what is a fellow to do? Perhaps il
was wrong to make love in quite such a
serious way as he did, but hang it! she
wasn't a kitten, and she might have
known he wasn't the marrying sort.
All that was a year ago, but he hadn't
forgotten her a bit-wOrse luck. And
her letters-how ewfullY nice they were
how like herselfi Not spOOny, like those
he wrote to her, but frank, humorous
and thoroughly bon camarade. Hang
| it all! it was much easier to keep heart
whole in London than IN this sultry and
monotOnOus hole. He had managed tc
evade compromising himself definitely
even when he had gone to bid Mrs. Len.
nOx goOd-bY, although he had beer
seriously near proposing to her thai
last evening; but he had got away, anG
nothing had been said which would have
ted him down to an engagement.
Dick, In his rowing life, had committed
every folly except that which he cOnsid
cred the hugest folly Of all-the folly Of
tying yourself to one woman for life
He remembered how he had congratu
lated himself on all this when he wen
On board the JummR. Was he, the best
looking fellow and the keenest sports
man in the One Hundred and FiftietI
Huzzars, to knock under like any spoony
young sub, the moment he met pretty
woman? But now things were changed
He had never bargained, somehow, fcl
her marrying again; he had got to 1Ool
upon her more or less as his own. WheI
she had written that letter with all the
illusions to ShorthOrn In II, his BLOOD
had fairly boiled. He didn't regret
bit the letter he had written In reply
telling her he was leaving India the Very
day he could get leave. and asking he
to be his wife. After ali, Why shouldn't
/ he marry? He was over 80, and he had
had, as he remembered with a smile, hi
fling" The other fellows In his regi
menb used to char him and call hin
casual" and said that he never did to
day what he could put of TIL tomorrow
But that was eli nonsense He could
make up his mind ike either men, ever
to matrimony. And her answer to hi
letter: sDo not come too late" Well